Escape
by nine miles to go
Summary: Santana has never been so alone in her life. When she starts to slip, it turns out that the only one who notices is the very boy whose heart she just helped crush. Eventual Samtana.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own Gleeee.

I started this last week when I unexpectedly began shipping Sam and Santana. So yes, they'll be somewhat together in this. It's mostly about Santana, though, and the aftermath of the Valentine's Day episode.

Anyway, here's my take on how they could've gotten together (basically if tonight's episode didn't happen). Enjoy? Lawlz.

* * *

**Escape**

Santana runs.

She runs past the playground, past the pharmacy, past Lima's sad excuse for a strip mall. She clears the boring fields and farm lands, until she's running by herself on a small, empty highway going nowhere, until she has no place to go except _back. _

But she doesn't. She keeps running, farther than she has ever run before. The wind is tearing at her skin, numbing it; her knees and ankles are grinding painfully with every smack of the pavement; her lungs are roaring in protest, and her every breath is gasped and strained.

It hurts. Everything hurts.

When she finally stops running she doesn't even notice. For a while she just walks aimlessly, her legs so wobbly beneath her that it hardly makes a difference.

It's nearing dark now. She doesn't recognize the area but she knows how to get home. She just doesn't want to.

It occurs to her that it doesn't matter if she just keeps walking, past all of these sad little podunk towns and ramshackle houses, miles and miles until she finally _gets somewhere_.

Nobody is waiting for her. Not the Cheerios, not Puck, not even her mother. If she disappears now, it might take days for somebody to notice, and by then she could start fresh. Be somebody else. Be somebody better. Somebody loved.

A strong gust of wind rushes past her, reminds her of the harsh reality of her situation: she's trapped. She's been slowly digging her own grave for years, distancing herself from anyone who had the potential to be faithful to her and hurting the people she loves most, and now that she's trapped at the bottom of it there's nobody to pull her back out.

She hugs her arms to her chest. It's cold. She needs to move, needs to run.

She forces herself to turn around, to face the direction of home, however far away it is. A feeling of dread settles in the pit of her stomach. Tonight she'll sleep in an empty house, and tomorrow she'll walk halls full of people who hate her, and then … and then it will happen all over again, her life is stuck on repeat, she is stuck in the world she spent years creating with no way out.

* * *

As she sits at the breakfast table the next morning she wonders why she didn't see it before. How everyone resents her, how nobody truly considers her a friend.

Before last week and Mr. Schuester's stupid Valentine's Day songs she never cared much about what everyone thought of her—she assumed that people were jealous, and it wasn't her fault if they didn't like it.

She thinks that maybe quitting the Cheerios has finally removed the glossy film from her eyes. She has nothing now—she is undefined, and for the first time she is just Santana, standing on her own.

A Cheerio always has friends. That's what other Cheerios are for: companionship, or at least the illusion of it. But Santana realized within a few hours of quitting the team that stripped of her Cheerios status, very few of the people she considered "friends" actually qualified.

She used to have Brittany. But Brittany is distant now—she is always tangled and intertwined with Artie, and seeing them so happy, so carefree, makes Santana's throat ache.

Brittany's happy. Brittany doesn't need her anymore.

And now that's she has quit the Cheerios, nobody else does, either.

* * *

She doesn't know where to sit at lunch anymore. The first few days after quitting the Cheerios she ditches school instead of facing the cafeteria, but she knows she can't hide forever.

"Excuse me? What are _you_ doing here?"

Berry. Ugh. Before Santana's butt can so much as touch the seat, the hobbit is already squawking at her.

Santana sits anyway, undeterred. "Sitting. Got a problem?"

Rachel squares her man shoulders in the most indignant and showy way she can manage. "In fact—" she huffs, but Mercedes cuts her off.

"Seriously, Santana, we just want to eat lunch in peace," Mercedes sighs. "Can't you just leave us alone?"

She feels the familiar reflex tugging at her, rising up in her throat like bile. _Cut her down!_ the impulse screams. _Put her back in her place!_

Santana bites her lip and wriggles in her seat. Her face is hot. She's defensive, insecure, _weak_. And for an instant she's sure that Mercedes can see it written all over her face. The other girl's eyes soften for a moment, like there might be some compassion behind them.

In that mortifying, exposed moment it feels absolutely necessary—like she's been holding her breath for a minute and her lungs are bursting. Before she can help herself, she says, "Fine, I can find somewhere else to sit, you freak shows."

She watches Mercedes' face harden again, her brow furrow in contempt, and instantly her stomach sinks. She doesn't mean it, she wants to say, but she never will. Instead she scoops up her mostly empty lunch tray and stalks out of the cafeteria, convincing herself she doesn't care, convincing herself that they're _jealous_ and she's _better than them_ even when she feels like scum.

In her bothered state she doesn't realize where she is walking until she slams straight into someone—someone big, big enough to send her lunch tray flying and her salad splayed out in a thousand directions.

"Oh, gosh, I'm sorry."

She recognizes that blundering voice. She cranes her neck upward to meet the eyes of the freakishly tall and annoyingly big-lipped Sam, then scoffs in his face, abandoning the mess and walking away.

There's a tug on her arm. "Hey, wait."

For some reason her eyes are watering, and even though she's definitely not crying, she still doesn't want him to see. She makes a point of not acknowledging him, and maybe that's why she shivers in surprise when she suddenly feels a hand in her hair.

She looks at him, incredulous. He's sheepishly holding a piece of lettuce in his hand.

"It got in your hair," he says. Then he smiles crookedly and offers it to her.

He must think he's charming. He must think he's cute. And he kind of is, and it disgusts her. "Ew," she says, just to watch the smile slide off his face.

It doesn't. God, he's annoying. He just keeps standing there with that goofy, stupid smile and that stupid piece of lettuce.

"Just watch where you're going next time," she snaps.

As she walks away she feels like he might be staring at her from behind. She looks back to scowl at him, to put him in his place, but he's gone, and she's oddly disappointed.

* * *

She used to feel like her days ended all too abruptly—that between school, socializing and Cheerios, there was relatively little time for anything else, and before she knew it the day was done.

Now it's the opposite. School seems to drag on for centuries, and she feels every minute of it like it's grating her bones. There's nothing to look forward to, no Cheerios or the competitions and parties and other perks that came with it. There's glee club, of course, but now that she knows everyone hates her, the relatively small appeal of it has been sucked out for good.

She goes to rehearsals anyway. Because even if these people hate her, they are still people, and it's better than being alone in a big house and counting the hours until it's socially acceptable to fall asleep and escape her life for a little while.

Rehearsal ends and for the first time, she waits to see if anybody will say something to her. A friendly bit of gossip, a passing comment about Mr. Schue's vest, even a good-bye.

But nobody does. She stands in the choir room, literally just stands there in the middle of it, watching people go. Trying to make eye contact with somebody. Anybody.

It feels like drowning.

Even Schuester leaves her there. He packs up his dorky little briefcase and slings it over his sweater vest-clad shoulder and shuts the door behind him, leaving her open-mouthed and disbelieving in his wake.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

What's stupid is that as she walks home by herself, she feels like singing. The very notion is enough to stop her in her tracks. Since when has she been this pathetic? Only desperate, needy people like Rachel and Finn burst out in song to stroke their own bruised egos, and she'll be damned if she becomes like one of them.

It's her determination to ignore her pain, perhaps, that leads her to the stupid move she makes next.

As soon as she rings the doorbell she understands that she has crossed some sort of invisible, unspoken line. It's true that she and Puck are as familiar with each other as anyone will ever be, but for some reason being this direct, this aggressive with each other, has always been sort of taboo. He has never invited her over, nor has she invited him. Neither of them wants to be the "needy" one who asks the other one to come by. They are alike in this prideful, selfish way, but it's always worked, so she's never cared.

But now that she remembers how it used to be with Puck, she realizes she doesn't even have that connection with him anymore. That she hasn't had that connection with him for months. When he came back from juvie he barely spared her a glance, and they've both been so caught up in their own lives that she didn't even notice the distance that's been steadily growing between them all this year until now.

By the time he's opening the door she absolutely knows she shouldn't be here—and by the look on his face, so does he.

He clears his throat awkwardly and shifts in the doorway so that his hand is resting against the frame, unconsciously barring her way inside. "Santana," he says. "What are you …"

"I—" she starts, but then she stops herself. "_I_" what? "_I just wanted to know someone in this world still wants me_"? "_I came over for desperate, self-pity sex, so can you please take off your pants_"? God, she's losing it. Oh, God. She stares at him and she realizes a full ten seconds have passed and it feels like a year, but she's just glued to the spot, paralyzed, struck dumb.

She shakes herself out of it. If aggressive is what Puck likes in a girl now, aggression is what he's going to get.

"Kiss me," she demands, leaning in and grabbing his head.

He resists easily. He's an entire foot taller than her so it's almost seamless how fast he grabs her arms and sets them back down at her sides.

"Whoa. Santana. You can't just–"

She can't give up yet. "Come on, Puck," she says, leaning in again, too close to his face to be friendly. "You can never say no to me."

"Santana—_no_."

She hears it, she hears it but she ignores it, she can't process the words. "We can go to my place right now," she says, trying to be seductive, but even she can hear the strain in her voice. "Nobody's home—just you and me, Puck, as loud and wild and insane as it always is—"

He physically grabs her shoulders and pushes her body off of him as if she weighs nothing more than a wafer and means nothing more to him than a penny. "Santana," he says firmly, "I'm just plain not interested."

Her chin is quivering. God have mercy, she feels like an idiot. She wracks her brain, tries to think of a snarky remark or quip to redeem herself, but there is absolutely nothing there except for her too loud heartbeat and nonsense words.

Finally she spits out, "When did you stop wanting me?"

Perfect. Fucking _outstanding_. If there is a prize for most pathetic, desperate girl of the year, she is surely a shoe-in now. His face is an almost unreadable mix of pity, irritation, and exasperation, but she knows him too well, she knows every line of his face and every tick in his expressions.

He sighs. "I don't know," he says, just like she knew he would. "I just can't deal with this right now. I'm in love with somebody else."

"That's a joke," she seethes. "You're in love with _me_."

"Santana," he says, surprised, unable to contain his guffaw. "We were never in love."

She knows it's true. That it was never "love," perse. But it all comes spinning back to her—the drunk parties, the late nights, the day he took her virginity, the make-out sessions in empty classrooms, the midnight runs to fast food joints that he called dates—and she sees that it's the closest thing to "love" that she's ever had.

And now it—_he—_is gone, too.

She smacks him. She has nothing biting to say, and it feels natural enough. It feels like something Santana the Bitch would do, and that's who she is, after all. A bitch.

"Jesus, Santana," he says. He wasn't expecting it. His hand is cupped to his face in surprise.

She doesn't care. She feels rotten inside and out.

If Puck doesn't want her, who else will?

"Get a fucking grip," he calls after her as she clambers up his driveway to her car.

"Fuck you!" she screams back at him.

She hears his front door slam shut and she knows that whatever they had between them is over. She gets into her car, jams the key in the ignition, and drives away, telling herself he never mattered to her anyway.

* * *

She can't sleep. She's tried everything. She exhausted herself on the treadmill, took a hot shower, shut her eyes and willed herself into unconsciousness, but nothing works. Her mind keeps racing, and every time she thinks she might just get some rest she feels her chest constrict and with a jolt she's awake again.

It occurs to her sometime around two in the morning that her mother won't be back for two weeks, and there's an entire cabinet of alcohol in the kitchen. She stands in front of the cabinet for a few moments and weighs her options.

Rum. Vodka. Whiskey. All the works. She's experienced in this realm and it doesn't take long to decide, and two shots of vodka later her throat is stinging but her body is warm and when she sets herself down on the couch, she finally lets her eyes slide shut—easy, peaceful, dark.

* * *

The next morning she wakes up at ten o'clock to her cell phone blaring. It's her mother.

"What," she answers.

Her mother sounds positively miffed on the other line. "Why did I just get a call from the school saying you were absent?"

She rolls her eyes. She's barely conscious, she shouldn't have to deal with this. "Mom—"

"I mean really, Santana, can't you just tone down the dramatics for two more weeks? How am I supposed to enjoy my vacation if I have to worry about my fully capable sixteen-year-old cutting class?"

"_Mom_—"

"Are you doing drugs? Is that what's going on? Do I need to get you a therapist?"

"Jesus, Ma," Santana finally cuts her off, having regained some sense of what's happening. "I just slept in, is all. Now do us both a favor and go hire some half-naked Mexican man to massage the stick out of your ass."

"Young lady-!"

She hangs up.

She knows she has to go to school, but she takes her sweet time doing it. She lingers in the shower too long, then spends an hour styling her hair and making up her face, then another half an hour scrutinizing herself.

She is pretty. Isn't she?

It's hard to know for sure, to be completely unbiased. She has always thought of herself as pretty—pretty enough to be a Cheerio, to win over boys, to get away with whatever she wants. But now she looks at herself in the mirror and all she sees is a girl trying too hard and getting too little for it.

A rash impulse suddenly strikes her and she turns on the faucet, planning to scrub the make up off her face, to tear out the too-tight ponytail she spent so long fashioning.

But she stops. Turns the sink off again. Stares at herself and her dark, ink-rimmed eyes, her too-shiny cheeks, her glossy, overdone lips.

How can she expect anyone to want to be her friend when she can't even bear to look at herself?


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

At rehearsal she ignores Puck and Puck ignores her and honestly, they're not acting much differently than the way they did before. The difference is that now she knows for certain that he doesn't want her, and she can't suppress her bitter, resentful feelings whenever he passes her line of sight.

Mr. Schuester says that this week they all have to pick out songs about journeys. A spiritual journey, an emotional journey, an actual journey— the typical sort of ballad, elevator-music inspired repertoire the man usually tries to shove down their throats.

Of course, it doesn't matter. She won't do the assignment. She hardly ever does, and it's not like anybody ever notices. They're all too wrapped up in themselves and high on their own voices to listen for anybody else's.

Santana knows this because she only cares about herself, and knows to expect the same from other people, too. The difference between her and them is that they will never admit to their selfishness, whereas she asserts it whenever she can.

Or she used to. Now she's just not sure what to do with herself.

"You missed Biology third period."

It's the first time anyone has spoken to her all day. "Huh?"

Sam is offering her a couple of somewhat weather beaten but empty worksheets. "It's the homework," he says when she doesn't take it from him.

She scowls at him. "You're in my biology class?"

He shrugs good-naturedly. "Three seats away from you, yeah."

She feels another unfamiliar pang in her stomach. He's so sincere, so sickeningly good-intentioned, and he's looking at her as if she hasn't made more than a dozen scathing, undeserved remarks about his bleached hair and huge mouth. As if she hasn't done everything in her power to break up with relationship with Quinn.

Until now she never considered the repercussions that might have for Sam.

She can't say she really cares. It's high time Quinn got what she deserved—little miss prissy perfect can't get away with everything by flashing a pearly white smile and swishing her stupid blonde locks around forever.

And besides, Sam is hardly even a real person to her. For the past few months she's just thought of him the way she thinks of every other dumb jock on the football team—expendable. And she intends to keep thinking of him that way.

"I never do the homework in that class," she says bluntly.

He's still extending them out to her as if she'll take them. It's the lettuce all over again, but somehow this is more pathetic.

"Well, just in case," he says.

She eyes him for a moment, trying to gage what possible benefit he thinks he can earn from doing this for her. But there doesn't seem to be some sort of hidden motive. He's just a nice guy, and that's it.

It's almost disappointing, knowing that he's not interested beyond making himself feel like he did his good deed of the day by helping her.

She flips her hair and turns away from him, denying him that small comfort. "Don't need it."

This is usually the point where his girlfriend comes and sweeps him away, very pointedly slinging her arm around his waist, marking him. Santana doesn't care about Sam, but she does care that Quinn is so smug about him. Really, he's not that much of a prize to be won.

"Are you mad at me or something? I just can't think of anything I did to you."

Santana freezes for a moment, then composes herself. "Aw," she says as she turns around, "you think I care enough about you to be mad about something?"

His eyes are intent on hers, watching for her next move. She wonders if there's a bone of aggression in his body, because he looks so ridiculously vulnerable just staring at her, but she remembers the way he beat the tar out of Karofsky and feels a little less bad about tearing him down.

"Listen up. I don't give a shit about anybody, least of all you. So don't get your jockstrap in a bunch if I'm not keen on stroking your little boy ego."

His expression doesn't change. "You're just an angry person, then."

"No," she says, surprised by this assessment. "I'm not angry. Just uninterested."

"There are nicer ways to be uninterested," he says under his breath, before leaving the choir room with the homework still tucked under his arm.

* * *

It's seven o'clock and she has nothing to do except go to bed, but she can't sleep. It's too early. She knows it, her body knows it, but all she wants to do is sleep.

She pours herself two shots and they go down even easier than the night before. After about ten minutes she's a bit drowsier but not nearly enough, so she takes another shot, and another, and only then do her muscles loosen, her head sagging warm and heavy on the pillow, finally asleep.

* * *

At lunch the next day Brittany sits next to her because Artie's cutting class with Finn. They both pick at their salads. They're best friends, they've always been, but now that Cheerios is over their conversations seem more stilted than usual. Without Cheerios there isn't all that much for them to talk about.

"Did you pick a song for glee club?" Brittany asks.

Santana raises an eyebrow. "Come on," she says. "I have better things to do."

Brittany shrugs. "Not really. Maybe we could pick something this week."

"Hmm," Santana mutters, disinterested. She knows she has a good voice, but in all honesty she isn't itching to show it off right now. She hasn't quite decided how she's going to define herself now that she's not a Cheerio, and becoming the next Rachel Berry certainly isn't an ideal option.

They eat in silence for a minute or so. Then Brittany asks, "Did you know that Quinn was cheating on Sam?"

Santana pauses. "People know about that now?"

Brittany smiles on one side of her mouth, obviously pleased to be in on the gossip for once. "Sam and Quinn were arguing at her house the other day, and Finn told Artie and Artie told me that Quinn was cheating."

Santana shrugs. "Yeah, I knew."

"You didn't tell me," says Brittany, a little accusatory.

"I've had other things going on," Santana snaps. Which is both a lie and a truth. She hasn't had anything going on, not really. Her life is more boring and empty than it's ever been. But for some reason her vengeance on Quinn has somewhat slid into the background—maybe now that Quinn is sick at home and out of sight, it doesn't seem as urgent or pressing as before. In any case, it sure hasn't been on her mind.

Brittany looks down at her plate.

"I'm sorry," Santana concedes. "I should have told you. I—"

She's about to tell Brittany about how she gave them mono, but something stops her. She certainly doesn't regret doing it. Quinn got what she deserved. But for some reason she holds her tongue, because she doesn't want Brittany to think less of her.

"It's okay," says Brittany. "We've been busy."

Santana fidgets in her seat, suddenly feeling uncomfortable about the whole thing. "So," she asks. "Are Quinn and Sam breaking up?"

"Dunno," says Brittany. "It's weird. I totally thought they'd get married."

Santana just stares at her salad, not sure what to say. "I didn't," she finally says, but by then Brittany's forgotten what they were talking about in the first place, and it doesn't matter what she did or didn't think. Because what's done is done. She made sure of that.

* * *

It's four o'clock in the afternoon and she's already had her nightly dose of three shots of vodka. She's not sure what possessed her. She came home and it felt like the walls were screaming and empty and she couldn't for _life_ of her stop thinking.

Now there's a warm buzzing feeling between her ears and all the ache is gone. It's amazing, what a little alcohol can do. She takes another shot and her head feels heavy. She takes another and the room tips slightly.

It occurs to her that she may be a little drunk right now. She's never been drunk alone before. She knows that there's something wrong, that she shouldn't be doing this, but right now she can't say that she cares. This is working. This is the only time this entire day she's felt the weight of her life and her choices lifted from her shoulders, and she feels nice, like she's swimming in warm water with her eyes wide open.

She giggles. She's drunk in her house and nobody cares. She can get away with anything, she's invincible, she's untouchable—she's alone.

No. This isn't what she wants. She isn't like this … she doesn't need this …

She's upset, but not for long. She feels her limbs growing heavy again, and then her head sags onto her pillow, a frown creasing her features as she falls asleep.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

"You look like my cat after she threw up those thumbtacks."

Santana lifts her head up from the desk ever-so-slightly to glare at Brittany, the lights of a classroom assaulting her aching eyes at full force. "Hmmph," she groans.

"Did you go to Danny's party last night?" Brittany furrows her nose in confusion. "I didn't see you there."

"No." She hides her head back in her sleeves, trying her best to muffle her senses.

"Then where did you go?"

"Nowhere," Santana snaps. "I was at home all night, okay?"

"Okay," says Brittany, and Santana feels a twinge of guilt for yapping at her best friend, but that's the thing about Brittany—it just bounces right off of her. A second later Brittany says, "Maybe you're sick. Like Finn and Quinn."

Her empty stomach twists unpleasantly. "Maybe."

The rest of the day she saunters through the school feeling as if she has a bag of bricks on resting on her shoulders. It's the first time she's ever been grateful to not be a Cheerio—she would never manage an entire grueling practice in this state. What on earth possessed her to drink like that anyway?

During her fourth period class she raises her hand to go to the bathroom, with absolutely no intention to return. She's at the bottom of the stairwell when she hears it:

"You made a promise. You _promised_ me."

It's the same One Tree Hill sob-story voice she's seen on television too many times. Whoever it is, their voice is all strained and muffled and upset. She rolls her eyes, but it's drama, and she has nowhere else to be, so she stays.

"Sam." She hears Quinn's voice and feels her heart beat in double time. She forgot over the last week how much that girl infuriates her, and just hearing her voice is enough to bring back her irritation in full force. "I'm so sorry."

"Sorry?" His voice cracks. "You're sorry. That's all you're going to say."

"I've said everything I can say. I know … there's no excuse for what I did."

Santana can practically see her. The way she'll jut out her chin in her show of being confident, but she'll let her eyes well up just a bit so she seems like she's just as emotionally tormented as he is. She'll look down, will the emotions into her expression, then look up, all mournful blue eyes and a sad curve of her delicate mouth.

Santana doesn't actually give a shit about Sam, but she hopes he doesn't fall for Quinn's act like everyone else does.

"You know that I never wanted to hurt you," Quinn pleads. "Sam, I love you."

There's a long pause, and Santana can't help but hold her breath, waiting for his response. If he gives into her she will forever judge him as spineless and stupid as the rest of his peers. And if he doesn't—

"Quinn. I can't do this anymore. I can't look at you without thinking about what you did."

-she might just have some respect for him after all.

"So … you're saying it's over," says Quinn. So that he has to be the one to decide. So she can tell everyone that he was the one who broke it off, and not her.

There's no hesitation this time. "Yeah. It's over."

Quinn tears out of the stairwell, passing Santana without noticing her. Santana doesn't move for a long time, knowing that Sam is still standing there, somehow afraid of him catching her. She wished she didn't listen in on them. She feels … oddly responsible.

It isn't her fault Quinn cheated on him, she convinces herself. Quinn needed to get what she deserved, and she did.

Santana has almost justified herself when Sam finally wanders out of his hiding place, his shoulders drooping and that ridiculous smile nowhere in sight.

She freezes. She's never felt self-conscious about eavesdropping or butting in on people's business, but he looks so raw and broken that for just an instant, she regrets everything. For one barely perceptible moment she wishes she could undo her meddling and put that goofy, stupid expression back on his big-lipped face.

He looks at her, but doesn't seem surprised to see her. His eyes barely acknowledge her. He lingers for only a second before walking away.

* * *

She goes straight home and drinks. It's stupid. She's hungover. She shouldn't be doing this. But she keeps seeing Sam's eyes, so hollow and blue and sad, and how he looked so forlorn walking away, and she thinks to herself, _Nobody will ever love me like that._

It's true. She will never inspire tears or remorse from any man. She is nothing more than a sex object, for whatever worth that has had lately. Nobody even wants her for that anymore.

So she drinks past the hangover, drinks past any clarity she has, until she forgets—but she doesn't forget, just sees Sam's face swimming in front of her eyes. Sees Puck, cold and uncaring. Sees every man she's ever seduced, every moment she's ever felt powerful—it's all nothing, it's a shame, her entire sense of pride and self has been built on something that _isn't real_.

She's so muddled that she thinks she might cry. She almost wishes she could. She has nobody, she _is_ nobody, and maybe something as silly and inconsequential as tears could comfort her.

But she can't cry. Her throat tightens, her cheeks redden, but no tears fall.

No wonder nobody will ever feel anything for her. She can't even feel anything herself.

* * *

The next day is Saturday, so it doesn't even matter when she wakes up at two in the afternoon feeling like someone ran her over with a tractor. She checks her phone—no texts, no missed calls. She isn't surprised. She stretches and tries to get out of bed, but it isn't worth the effort, so she lets herself fall back asleep.

* * *

It's dark when she wakes up again. She checks her phone and this time there's a text from her mother, slightly jumbled and drunken, informing her that she'll be spending yet another week in Mexico. In her hungover daze she doesn't care. She wonders if it would make a difference, even, if her mom just left for good.

She goes downstairs and turns on the television. Nothing is on, and nothing good is recorded except reruns. She watches infomercials for a few hours, eats a bowl of cereal, and stares at the clock.

Time is moving too slowly. She doesn't even know what she's waiting for, except that she wants the time to just pass already. It used to feel like the hours were just slipping through her fingers, and now it feels like they're smothering her.

She finds her laptop and isn't surprised to see that Quinn and Sam are both listed as single again. She checks his page. It's not updated. Hers hasn't even been updated in weeks, and nobody's even bothered to write on her wall. She logs off, annoyed at herself for looking, annoyed at herself for caring.

Then she can't bear to be in the house another moment longer. Her eyes flicker to the liquor cabinet, but she knows that she shouldn't. She walks over to it anyway. Puts her hand on the glass.

She can't. She won't. She _won't_.

Instead she runs upstairs and shoves a sports bra over her head and laces up her sneakers. There are other ways to escape.

* * *

At about mile three her stomach starts churning and her heart starts pounding in her head. She's too hungover for this. She stops on the side of the road to throw up, retching everything left in her stomach.

She sits there for a moment. Her limbs are shaking, her stomach is roiling, and she's three miles away from home. She's in a neighborhood she's not that familiar with, and it's stupid Lima, so nothing's open this late anyway. She has no choice but to go home.

It's clear that she can't just hop up and make her way back. She sits for a while, trying to wait out the nausea, letting the music in her headphones blast and drown out the sounds of noisy crickets. She smells the night air and for some reason it makes her think of her father, and then she remembered being much smaller, her body lifted up in the air to look at the stars.

She'd look at them now but her head is killing her. Finally she pries herself off of the sidewalk and makes the long, debilitating walk home, feeling a little jilted at the notion of how things might have been if he hadn't left them that night.

Would her mother be normal? Would they feel like a family? Would they have what Kurt and Finn's family has, and eat dinner together and call if they weren't home after eight?

She looks behind her and sees an open road that leads to nowhere and again, feels the same tug at her side that she's felt all month. _Escape_. If she leaves now, nobody will be the wiser.

She sighs. Turns back. Keeps walking home.

But she can't think of one good reason why.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter Five

The next day she gets a call from a number she doesn't recognize.

"Hello," she answers.

The response is immediate and almost too high-pitched to be coherent. "_Santana_, where _are_ you?" Rachel screeches into the phone. "You were supposed to meet us at the grocery store half an hour ago!"

Santana scowls. "What now?"

"The fundraiser! We're singing at the grocery store! How on earth did you—"

"Santana, it's me, Brittany," says a familiar voice on the other end. "Where are you? I'm cold and nobody else here knows my cat's name."

The scowl on her face relaxes slightly. "I'll be there," she says grudgingly. "Just give me a half an hour."

When she finally arrives, flawless and perfectly coiffed, the glee club is already covered in raw egg and slushy. Normally she would care but she almost feels as if she deserves it, so she stands in line with them, bobbing her hips back and forth as unenthusiastically as possible.

"Are you going to Sarah's party tonight?" Brittany asks her as another slushy-bearing football player advances on them and the glee club disperses in all different directions.

Santana almost asks, "What party?", but then remembers she has to keep up appearances. "Dunno yet. Sounds lame," she says instead, because she's instantly cooler than something she calls lame.

Brittany shrugs. "I'm going. We haven't been out together in awhile."

"You've got Artie," Santana says, not even bothering to hide the bitterness in her voice.

Brittany grabs her hand and squeezes it. "You're still my best friend."

Her throat tightens. She looks at Brittany, suddenly overcome with gratitude, when a feeling unlike anything she has never known hits her—and _shit, is it cold!_

She stands petrified for a moment, spluttering and frozen and shaking. She feels slushy oozing down her perfectly parted hair, dripping down her bangs and sliding down her bra. Her eyes are stinging so badly she can barely see two feet in front of her.

But she can hear. Hear them all laughing at her. Her face burns, her body tenses, and every part of her screams to _hurt somebody _for doing this to her.

Her eyes scan the crowd until she finds the man responsible. _Karofsky_. It figures that it would be him, and after what he did to Kurt she has no reservations about kicking him in the balls so far up he spits them out. She wasn't a Cheerio for nothing, after all.

She doesn't know what possesses her to do it—the humiliation, the hopelessness of her life, or maybe just plain suicide—but she screams like an animal and launches herself at him in full force, flinging her entire body against his.

It's ineffective at best. He stumbles a bit in surprise, and she feels herself start to fall, but she'll be damned if she goes down alone. She grabs him by the collar of his varsity jacket and they both slam down on the cement, her head impacting with enough force for her to see stars.

It doesn't matter. Her blood is boiling, there's slushy all over her, and half of Karofsky's weight is now saddled on her as well.

She kicks and wriggles and claws at his face. "_Fuck you!_" she shrieks. "Who the _fuck_ do you think you _are?_"

The element of surprise doesn't help her for long. She watches as Karofsky's eyes settle on hers and his brain catches up to the last three seconds, and then in slow motion she feels him yanking her upward, pushing her against the brick wall of the grocery store.

"You got a problem, glee freak?" he yells.

"The hell, Karofsky, you're gonna hit a _girl?_" Santana throws back at him. There's blood in her mouth. She doesn't have enough time to wonder why.

The brute seems to hesitate for a moment. The other football players start backing away—even these morons know that hitting a girl will lead them nowhere good. Santana looks around the parking lot, searches for the glee club, for anybody, but all she sees is gaping shoppers who she immediately hates for watching her sink this low and doing nothing to help.

Karofsky's about to let her go when she spits in his face. She sees his eyes widen, feels his fists curl tighter around her arms. He lifts a balled up hand and aims for her face. She squeezes her eyes shut tight, head spinning, waiting for the punch to connect with her skull, when instead she feels the rush of his grip releasing her and falls to the ground.

"Get the hell off of her!" Sam yells.

Santana just stares. Sam has Karofsky pinned to the ground in a chokehold. She's never seen him this mad before.

And it's a little bit hot.

"What are you going to do about it, Evans?"

Sam nails him in the face, and the punch makes Karofsky splutter, struck dumb. "You _don't _hit a _girl_," Sam yells. "You can _never hit a girl!_ What the hell is _wrong_ with you—"

Somehow Karofsky has freed an arm and he swings at Sam, who reels back, losing his grip. Blood immediately spurts from his nose and Santana feels for him, tasting the metallic blood in her own mouth.

"You're not even the quarterback! You're _nothing!_" Karofsky screams.

"Santana," she hears someone say. "Santana—"

She looks up toward the voice, but the edges of her vision are blurring, and it's hard to lift her head up. She hears something crunch in the fight a few feet away and hopes it's Karofsky's skull.

"She's bleeding," the same voice yaps over the commotion, and Santana realizes it's Rachel crouched next to her on the ground, and for some reason she's overwhelmed with gratitude. "Her head's bleeding, _guys_, stop _fighting!_"

For a moment the blurs that are the boys in front of her stop moving. She sees their heads turn to her and for a split instant she sees Sam's eyes, so clear and blue and level on hers, as if time has stopped all around them and they are looking straight into each other's cores.

Then Sam whips around and elbows Karofsky in the guy. "You did this," he seethes, and even though Karofsky is down and has no fight left in him, Sam kicks him.

"_Stop it_, Sam, he's had enough," Mercedes orders.

Sam doesn't seem to hear her. He's walking toward Santana, bending down to look at her. She doesn't expect his voice to be so gentle. "Can you get up?" he asks.

She tries to nod. She doesn't understand why he's being so good to her, why he's fighting her battles and looking out for her. She ruined his life.

Her legs are wobbling beneath her and she can't seem to find her balance to get up. Something is warm and sticky on the back of her neck—too warm to be slushy. She touches it, feels it seeping on her skin, and looks at her hand.

Red. Everywhere. Her breath hitches and she feels like a little kid, because she's just staring at it, it's bad, and she doesn't know what to do—

Two strong arms raise her up from under her armpits then swoop her feet off the ground. "I've got you," says Sam, and she doesn't even protest, just staring at her blood-stained hand in shock.

The other glee members must have come back because all at once she can hear them, their gasps and panic. It makes it so much worse, as if they've all become a manifestation of her own fear. She looks up at Sam and he stares back, his face bloody but his expression sincere and determined, and it's the only peace she can find.

"You're gonna be okay," he says. "You're a Cheerio. You've had worse than this."

_Was a Cheerio,_ she wants to say, but instead she laughs, because he's probably right.

"She needs an ambulance." It's Matt, and his voice is so low he probably doesn't think she can hear him, but she does. Sam nods and Matt pulls out his cell phone and starts dialing.

"No," Santana croaks, but her throat is too tight, they can't hear her. "No …"

The darkness starts creeping in, and for the first time in weeks, she resists it. She needs to stay awake.

"Santana," she hears Sam say. "_Santana_."

And then nothing more.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter Six

When she wakes up in the hospital room, she's alone. Her head is aching worse than any hangover she's ever experienced, and her initial thought is that she must have fallen off of the top of the pyramid, and Coach Sylvester is going to kick her off the Cheerios for sure.

Then she remembers that she quit the Cheerios. That it doesn't matter that she's laying in a hospital bed alone, because she has nothing left to lose.

She touches her head and feels the heavy bandaging, and it all starts coming back in bits and pieces. The fundraiser. The slushy. Fighting with Karofsky.

Sam.

She sighs, leaning back into the pillow. Her eyes close as if she can block out the embarrassing images that are fleeting through her memory—taking on a football player, losing, then bleeding on the sidewalk like a pathetic, stupid girl—and Sam, the whole time, defending her, coming to her rescue, when she deserved it less than anybody.

It's fitting, that's she's alone right now. She should be alone.

Except when she opens her eyes, she isn't.

"You're awake," says Sam.

He's standing in the open doorway and looks kind of stupid, shifting his weight between his feet like he doesn't know what to do next. An awkward ten seconds pass and he looks at her as if he expects her to say something, and when she doesn't he says, "How are you feeling?"

She rolls her eyes. "Like a million bucks."

He cracks one of those goofy smiles. "I bet." He walks across the tiny room and sits in one of the chairs, which she now sees has his cell phone and wallet and wrappers from vending machine snacks beside it. She wonders why on earth he would sit in a disgusting, boring hospital and wait for her to wake up, but she shouldn't care. It's Sam. He just does that kind of thing.

After a moment he says, "We couldn't reach your parents."

She snorts derisively. "Of course you couldn't."

"Mr. Schuester came instead."

She doesn't say anything. It figures it would take getting knocked out in a parking lot for Schuester to acknowledge her existence. She stares down at the hospital bed sheets because she is, at the very least, glad that Schuester bothered to come, even though she's embarrassed by it.

"He's downstairs," Sam adds, because it's clear he doesn't know what to say any more than she does.

"Listen." She looks up at him, with his big eyes and his weird hair and tentative smile, and forgets what she's going to say. Her tongue feels sort of thick, and she feels almost self-conscious, sitting here on a strange bed and jumbling all the words in her brain.

For a second she thinks she might be nervous because of him. Then she remembers that she's probably loaded with drugs right now, so it's no wonder that she feels so addled.

When she feels like she's just about able to construct a coherent sentence he's still just staring at her, patient as ever. She wonders if anything will faze this kid, and then with a guilty pang she remembers that something did, and then she loses her trail of thought all over again.

"Some cops showed up and arrested Karofsky. The manager watched everything go down, and there's security tapes and stuff, so—"

"Why did you—" Santana interrupts, but she's not sure what she's asking. Why did he fight Karofsky for her? Why did he always treat her like a decent human being? Why did he seem to be the only guy who didn't fall for Quinn's act?

She clears her throat. "Why did you … do … that?" she says pathetically.

He just shrugs. "Anyone would have."

_But nobody else did_, she thinks.

"I—" she starts. "Well. Uh."

"You're welcome," he says, and his smile is so goofy and dumb that she can't help but smile back.

She looks him up and down, trying to look at him with an unbiased eye for the first time since she met him. Last week he meant nothing to her. But now, now there's something there, something she didn't see before, or something she ignored. And it bothers her.

"You're too nice to people," she says critically.

"Hardly," he snorts. "I just beat the shit out of somebody."

"He deserved it," Santana reminds him.

Sam sighs. "Still."

That's when Schuester walks in. "Santana," he says, and his voice cuts through the air in the room so suddenly that she only realized then that she and Sam had been speaking in near whispers. "I see you're awake."

The man is so forcibly cheery that she can almost feel the strain in his smile. She doesn't bother smiling back, just shifts away from him and stares at the wall. What should she care? It's not like he ever paid attention to her at all until now.

Schuester barely even reacts to her cold reception. "Sam, your mom is waiting for you in the parking lot, she said it's a school night and she wants you home."

"It's nighttime?" she can't help but ask, because it didn't even occur to her before that time might have passed.

Sam looks between her and the door a few times. "I—I can stay," he says, even though he clearly can't.

"Go," says Santana.

He nods, looking a little hurt. "Feel better."

"Sam—"

He stops.

The word is like peanut butter in her throat, but if there's ever a time to use it, it's now. "Thanks."

When that boyish smile creeps back on his face she's almost sad to watch him leave.

* * *

It takes her a few hours to convince Schuester that her mom isn't going to leave Mexico, and even then he only believes her because when they finally reach her mom's cell phone she slurs her way through some story about margarita night and nonrefundable plane tickets.

Her mom's idea of an emergency contact is her boozy friend Jill who insists on keeping Santana for the night after she's released from the hospital. Schuester takes one look at the woman, clearly can tell she is less than capable of handling a teenager with mild head trauma, and dumps Santana there anyway. And to top it all off, she can't find her cell phone, which she can only assume has been crunched under someone's tire in the grocery store parking lot.

She misses school on Monday and sits around watching television with Jill, ignoring her snarky remarks at the desperate housewives of somewhere and her lame attempts at conversation. The woman's an idiot and leaves her liquor everywhere—Santana doesn't even feel bad pilfering it, and is slightly buzzed before three o'clock that afternoon right under Jill's abnormally large nose.

At three thirty the doorbell rings, and Jill calls her over and says it's for her. Santana pops another painkiller and gets up from the couch, wondering who on earth could possibly find her in this godforsaken house.

"Hey."

It's Brittany, standing somewhat meekly in the doorway. Santana doesn't realize that she's mad at her friend until she sees her there, but she is. She's angry. Angry that Brittany wasn't slushied like she was, angry that Brittany wasn't there at the hospital when she woke up, angry that she hadn't been there for her in months.

But most of all she is angry because she knows she deserved all of those things in the first place.

"I, uh, I have your phone." Brittany holds it out to her. "It must have fallen out after Karofsky …"

Santana takes it from her and slides it into her pocket wordlessly. Brittany flounders for a moment, rubbing the palms of her hands on the fabric of her jeans the way she always does when she's uncomfortable.

"Santana—"

"You weren't at the hospital. Why weren't you there?" Santana demands.

Brittany looks sorry, sincerely sorry, but Santana can't let her off so easily. If Brittany is going to phase her out of her life, then Santana will be damned if she doesn't push Brittany away first.

"I—" Brittany starts.

"Why was it that I woke up to _Sam Evans_, some random nobody, and not my _best friend?_"

"I'm sorry," says Brittany again, trying to overpower her. She steps forward to embrace Santana, but Santana reels back. "Please, Santana, I'm sorry. My mother wouldn't let me stay—"

"Bullshit," Santana yells. "Since when do you listen to your mom?"

"Since Artie told me to," says Brittany, "and he's right, things are _better_ now, we get along, and—"

"_Better?_ Things are _better_ now," Santana repeats derisively. Brittany flinches like there are knives coming at her, and Santana knows better than this, knows that Brittany and her mother have struggled for years and that any sort of a breakthrough is good news, but right now she doesn't give a shit about that. "I'm so glad things are _better_ for you. So why don't you just go leave and go live your perfect little life without me—"

"What are you talking about?"

Brittany's incredulous—of course she is, she hasn't been here, she doesn't know how Santana's feeling, doesn't even see how she's been pulling apart from everyone and everything—

"It doesn't matter," Santana jeers.

"It does," Brittany says lowly. "You matter to me."

_Not enough_, she thinks childishly. She folds her arms in front of her chest, juts out her chin, shifts all of her weight to one hip. She is not going to cry.

"Santana," Brittany says again, and just hearing her name like that makes her lose all of her resolve and let the tears prick at her eyes. But Brittany walks forward, a question in her eyes, a curiosity that wasn't there a few seconds before. "Are you … have you been drinking?"

Her blood runs cold. "No," she says immediately.

Brittany tilts her head knowingly. "You're my best friend. I know what you look like drunk."

"I'm _not drunk_," Santana scoffs, and even she can hear the slight slur of her words. "I mean, I just got my brain rattled less than twenty four hours ago, so _excuse_ me if I seem a little out of sorts—"

"Okay," Brittany says, backing off. "Okay. I believe you. I'm sorry."

"Good," says Santana. And for some reason she can't quite explain, she's disappointed that Brittany believes her.

Brittany's still standing in the doorway and now there is an awkward tension that there never was before. The atmosphere has never been so uncomfortable between them, not even in their worst fights and most terrible moments. Santana knows she owes Brittany an explanation for her behavior, but she isn't a big enough person. She can't.

"Are you coming to school tomorrow?" Brittany asks.

Santana shrugs. "I don't know."

Brittany's feet shuffle on the welcome mat. "Well. I hope you will." She steps forward and takes Santana's hand, and this time Santana doesn't pull away. "I know you haven't gone anywhere. But I miss you."

Santana looks down at the floor. "Me too."


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter Seven

Going back to school is such a mind-numbingly boring experience that just sitting in class and waiting for the clock to move forward feels like rubbing sandpaper against her skin. There's still a bandage on her head and now she feels like even more of an outcast than she did after quitting the Cheerios. People gape at her in the hallways and whisper to each other and she feels like screaming at them, but her feet are heavy and her shoulders are sore and she just doesn't have the energy for it.

Karofsky seems to have been suspended. She doesn't see him anywhere, and he's not one to cower. She hopes he gets expelled—at least one good thing would come out of this throbbing in her head, and maybe then Kurt could come back.

In biology class she notices Sam for the first time, three seats away from her, just like he said he was. He smiles at her so unabashedly that she almost looks away—he's too friendly for his own good, so friendly that it's almost freakishly irregular, and maybe that's why she has always discounted him.

This time, though, she smiles back. It's small and fleeting and half-assed at best, but it's a smile, and she doesn't think she's capable of much more than that.

"You look tired," says Sam once class is out.

She considers her ill-thought-out binge drinking spree with Jill the night before, and how when the alarm went off the next morning her head throbbed intensely enough to make her dive for the bottle of painkillers under the guest bed.

"Are you feeling any better?"

She almost tells him no. Of course she doesn't feel any better. Her life is a mess, she has no friends, no plan, nothing.

But for some reason, she lies. "Yeah."

He sets a hand on her shoulder. Her first impulse is to jerk away, and he seems to sense her discomfort, but still doesn't move. "I'm glad," he says.

And it's only just then, when their eyes connect the same way they did back at the grocery store, that she sees the pain in his eyes—sees it so clearly that she thinks for a moment she must be standing in a mirror. She stares at the way his jaw is set, the way his smile tightens, the way his brows crease into a slight frown, and all of it radiates the same loneliness she's felt for weeks.

She wonders when she started knowing his face so well, that now she can spot the tiny, near imperceptible shifts in his expression.

He takes his hands off her shoulders and starts packing his books into his bag.

"How about you?"

The words slip out of her before she even realizes she's thinking them.

Sam looks up at her. "Huh?"

"I—" she stammers. "I mean, how are you … are you … I wondered if you were doing okay, too. After the whole. Well."

"Yeah, that," he says, glossing over it as if it means nothing, as if she didn't see him tear out of a stairwell anguished and near tears. "It's—well, I'm fine. Things happen."

"I'm sorry," Santana says dumbly.

Sam waves her off. "It's not your fault."

There's a lump in her throat the size of an egg. It _is_ her fault. "Sam …"

"I'll see you in Glee club," he says, and then he hurries out of the room without looking back.

* * *

Most of glee club she just sits around and watches. The other kids are taking the assignment way too seriously, and have all paired up for different "songs about journeys"—it's as cliché as a Hallmark ad, and she makes no attempt to disguise her boredom.

Halfway through Tina and Mercedes' rendition of "Life is a Highway," Quinn and Finn enter the room. Together. The entire room can't help but stare at the two of them and back at Sam, who looks down and pretends to be busy finding something in his backpack as soon as he sees them.

The song goes on but even the performers seem thoroughly distracted. Finn and Quinn are holding hands, their fingers laced, their heads held high and shoulders thrown back as if they still rule the school and no time has passed since Quinn's pregnancy scandal and her cheating on her boyfriends.

She looks so happy, so smug. Usually it pisses Santana off. Now she wants to claw at her.

It's different now, and she's trying to understand why when she sees Sam flinch out of the corner of her eye—and then she knows. She hates Quinn for doing this to Sam. For waltzing in without a care in the world, like she's the only one who matters, and if she's happy then everybody else should be, too.

Her thoughts are venomous. She knows Quinn doesn't think this way, but she needs this, needs a reason to hate her.

The performance ends and Santana claps distractedly. Finn and Quinn are still holding hands, practically having sex with their eyes, and it's sickening to watch them—but even worse to watch Sam.

Schuester lets them go for the afternoon and Santana lingers. She's not sure what she wants to say to Sam—a part of her wants to absolve herself of guilt, tell him what it was that she did and how it broke him and Quinn apart, and the other part of her just wants to sit with him, be near him, because there is something drawing her toward him that she can't explain.

"Hey, Sam," she says quietly.

He doesn't hear her.

"Sam," she says again, louder.

"_What?_" he snaps. When he looks up his entire expression is contorted, the tips of his ears and his cheeks red with humiliation. He takes a deep breath and composes himself and says again, more calm this time, "What?"

"I just thought if … maybe you wanted to talk—or something—"

He shakes his head. "Thanks," he says. "But I'm fine. Really."

Then he walks toward the door, leaving her in the choir room alone. He's about to disappear when she calls out, "You're lying!" but he doesn't stop, doesn't even hesitate, just keeps walking away.

* * *

The rest of the day is a drunken blur. Jill, it turns out, is more than happy to share, and by the time the woman is slack-jawed and too drunk to keep her head up, Santana is still at it, determined to drink away the look on Sam's face.

_It's not your fault._ She hears his voice like a broken record, over and over again, seeping into her consciousness against her will._ It's not your fault, it's not your fault, it'snotyourfault … _

God, it's all her fault. Her throat is burning, her head is throbbing, her eyes are streaming, and she deserves it, because it's _all her fault_.She did this to him. He was happy, he had Quinn and they were going to get married and have babies and live happily ever after, and she destroyed him. The one person who ever cared about what happened to her.

She feels like she might cry, and she chokes and gasps, trying to let herself, but instead it comes out like a strangled laugh. She hears herself and she sounds like a hyena. It's too much, it's stupid, she doesn't know why she even gives a shit about him when she so easily disregarded all the other people in her life who tried to reach out to her.

He's different. It makes no sense, but everything she used to hate about him she is grateful for now, when it's too late to take it back.

When she wakes up in the morning she's still drunk, with a killer hangover already starting to form. The only thing she can think of is to down a few more shots, which might take the edge off for a few hours. It doesn't occur to her that she's not supposed to go to school drunk, but it does occur to her that she shouldn't drive, so she begins stumbling to school, barely managing to put one foot in front of the other.

She makes it about halfway there when a car screeches to a halt on the side of the road next to her.

"Get in."

She squints toward the driver for a few moments and then makes out Sam's bleached hair and critical expression. A giant grin grows sloppily on her face and she has to suppress a giggle.

"Hey, you," she says.

He's not amused, and for once he doesn't smile back. "Santana," he says, leaning over to fling open his passenger door. "Get in the car."

"Why do you get to tell me what—what to do?" she asks, but even so she's obeying, clambering into his car with the grace of a sea slug.

"Put on your seatbelt."

"Fine, fine, fine," she mutters. It takes a couple of times for her to fit the buckle in, and she feels him watching her, judging her. Her face is hot with embarrassment. Why is he always the one who sees her at her worst?

Without saying a word he turns the car around and starts driving in the opposite direction of the school. Her heart thuds with alarm. "Where are we going?"

He doesn't answer her. "You're drunk," he says instead.

She scoffs. "No I'm _not_," she says impetuously.

His lips are a thin, pressed line and she knows there's no point in lying, that Sam's no fool, but she slouches stubbornly in the passenger seat anyway. He keeps driving in silence. It's so tense and suffocating in his car that she wishes she were still in bed, missing school, all alone rather than sitting in his car under his watchful, judgmental gaze.

For months she has been so upset and alone in the world, and now that somebody finally sees her she wishes more than anything that she could disappear.

He stops the car at an empty park.

"What?" Santana splutters. "What's your point?"

Sam just shakes his head. "I get it now."

He's not looking at her, but looking straight ahead, past the trees and the playground. His eyes narrow in thought, and she wonders why he is doing this, why he it just making her sit here in the middle of nowhere while he has some great revelation.

"Get _what?_" she demands.

"Why you've been acting so strange these past few weeks," he says.

He's still not looking at her. She's furious, she wants to shake him, wants to scream _look at me! _at the top of her voice, but apparently he already has—and he's seen everything.

Her heart lurches. He _knows._

And that's when he finally meets her horrified gaze. "You've been drinking. All of these nights. And showing up to school hungover and barely functioning every day."

It's not an accusation because he leaves no room for her to defend herself. It's a statement. A fact. He doesn't even wait for her to acknowledge the truth because he is so confident in his assessment that nothing she says will convince him otherwise.

She doesn't know how to feel. A part of her is humiliated. She has spent her entire life alienating people, making sure she is on the top of the pyramid both figuratively and literally, and the only way she knows to do that is to never show weakness. Never expose herself for what she really is. And now she's naked in Sam's eyes, and every part of her is on display, every sad, broken, pathetic part.

And yet … there is also relief. After her heart stops pounding and her ribs stop squeezing and she finally lets her shoulders unknot, there is a strange, unmistakable, flood of relief, that somebody _knows_, that somebody cares, that somebody notices.

"Why, Santana?" he demands. "Why are you doing this? Is it because of Puck? Is it because of the Cheerios?" His eyes are piercing, insistent, inescapable. "Because God, Santana, you can't do this to yourself, whatever the reason, there has to be—"

"It's my fault," she blubbers, and it feels like dropping a glass vase and watching in the split seconds before it hits the floor, but she can't stop now, she has to say it. "It's my fault you and Quinn broke up, _I knew_, so I was the one who—I gave Finn mono so he—and she would have to get it, too, so then you'd know, and you'd break up with her, because I _hate her_, but I didn't—I didn't think that you—I didn't think I'd care, and—"

That's when she finally snaps out of it, gasping and spluttering and smacking a hand to her mouth as if she can grab all the words back and swallow them. Sam just stares at her, uncomprehending, his eyes darting between hers as he tries to gather some meaning from everything she just spewed.

She knows it's only a matter of time before he pieces it together. She grabs for the door handle.

"Wait." He grabs her arm. Not forcefully enough to keep her there, but enough to stop her.

"I'm sorry," she moans. "Sam, I'm so sorry."

He frowns, still staring at her, still not understanding. "None of that made any sense," he acknowledges. "But … Santana. If you thought it was your fault that I broke up with Quinn, you're wrong." His eyes seem more distant again, they way they did back in the biology room. "It was Quinn's fault. She cheated on me."

Santana shakes her head vehemently, trying somehow through the cloud of alcohol to explain herself, explain how she hurt him. "If it weren't for me, you'd—you'd never have known."

He stares at her incredulously for a few moments, and then he surprises her. He laughs.

"It's not funny," Santana snaps, because she's been guilt-ridden for days, because she ruined his life and he should be _mad at her_, not pulling over in his car to give her rides and beating up football players for her—

"I knew Quinn was cheating long before the mono," he admits. "I just … I didn't want to believe it."

She knows he's saying it to comfort her, but it doesn't work. It doesn't change what she did. Not just to Sam—but to all the people in her life, the ones that she hurt, pushed away, took for granted.

"What am I supposed to do now?" she asks.

For a long time he doesn't answer. She wonders what he thinks she means, because she's not even sure she does. There are so many burned bridges, so many lost chances, so many mistakes. She doesn't even know where to begin, doesn't know what to fix, let alone how to fix it.

"Well, you can't go to school today. I can drop you off at my older sister's apartment."

She blinks up at him dumbly. "I meant about everything else."

He puts the key back in the ignition and starts the car. She doesn't think he's going to answer her, but as they're about to pull out of the park he gives her a slight smile and says, "One step at a time."


End file.
